Bank Of France Governor: ECB Should Focus On Crypto Exchanges

Francois Villeroy de Galhau, governor of the Bank of France and policymaker at the European Central Bank (ECB), has said new laws are needed to target cryptocurrency exchanges.

De Galhau: We ‘Should Work On’ Exchanges

Speaking at the City Week banking conference in London April 24, de Galhau, who has gone on record to make some curious claims about cryptocurrency in the past, appeared to choose the industry as a specific point of interest.

“In particular, we should work on exchanges and platforms which provide services at the interface between crypto-assets and the real economy,” media sources quote him as saying.

While he remained conversely tight-lipped on ECB financial policy going forward, the institution has made significant noises about the need to regulate crypto markets this year.

Specifically, the international community should work together to develop appropriate measures, ECB board member Benoît Cœuré said at the World Economic Forum 2018 preempting the topic appearing during March’s G20 Summit in Buenos Aires.

Is Bitcoin A Cryptocurrency Now, Francois?

Compared to ECB Supervisory Board Chair Daniele Nouy, however, de Galhau stands out, Nouy having told mainstream media in February that regulating crypto within the EU was “not exactly very high on its to-do list.”

“We scrutinize the issue in a regulatory perspective, we are ready to do something if it was needed,” she said, hinting a wait-and-see attitude was more appropriate at bloc level.

De Galhau’s comments may well be met with shrugs from those who remember his track record.

Last year, for instance, when Bitcoin prices were approaching their $20,000 all-time highs, the Bank of France chief said he thought Bitcoin was “not a cryptocurrency” at all:

We need to be clear: Bitcoin is in no way a currency or even a cryptocurrency. It is a speculative asset. Its value and extreme volatility have no economic basis, and they are nobody’s responsibility.